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Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring:
Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas
with surface-collected off-site material
Nicolas Poirier
To cite this version:
Nicolas Poirier. Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dy-
namics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material. Jan Klapste. Agrarian
technology in the medieval landscape, Brepols Publishers, p.279-290, 2016, 978-2-503-55137-1.
<halshs-01303474>
HAL Id: halshs-01303474
https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01303474
Submitted on 18 Apr 2016
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N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-
collected off-site material”, in: Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-
290.
Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring:
Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material
Les preuves archéologiques de l'épandage de fumure :
étudier les dynamiques spatiotemporelles des espaces agraires avec le mobilier hors-site de
prospection
Archäologische Quellen zur Ackerdüngung. Erkenntnisse zur Entwicklung des Ackerlandes in
Raum und Zeit durch die Prospektion des Scherbenschleiers
Nicolas Poirier, Chargé de Recherche CNRS - UMR 5608 TRACES, équipe Terrae, Maison de la
Recherche - Université Toulouse 2 - Jean-Jaurès, 5 Allées Antonio Machado - 31058 Toulouse
Cedex 9, [email protected]
Summary
Manuring is a farming practice that left archaeological traces. Indeed, the incorporation of waste into manure has resulted in
the spreading of broken pottery across manured plots. The interpretation of off-site scatters as remains of manuring is based
on ancient texts and archaeological evidences. The French Archaedyn project aimed at identifying major trends and local
peculiarities regarding the amendment of fields from Antiquity to Modern Times, on several French study areas. We defined
indicators to estimate the stability and durability of agrarian occupation, based on the spatial analysis of off-site material. The
results give the image of spatial and temporal changes of cultivated areas in the long term.
Zusammenfassung
Düngung ist eine Praxis der Landwirtschaft, die sich archäologisch erfassen lässt. Der Zuschlag von Abfall zur Mistdüngung
führte zur Verteilung von Keramikscherben auf allen gedüngten Flächen. Die Interpretation dieses off-site-Scherbenschleiers
basiert auf Schriftquellen wie auf archäologischen Indizien. Das französische Projekt Archaeodyn will in verschiedenen
Regionen Frankreichs generelle Trends und regionale Entwicklungen der Bodennutzung von der Antike bis zur Neuzeit
identifizieren. Aufgrund der räumlichen Ausprägung des Scherbenschleiers wurden Kriterien zur Abschätzung der Intensität
und Dauer der Ackernutzung definiert. Damit lassen sich langfristige zeitliche und räumliche Wechsel der Landnutzung
zeigen.
Résumé
L'épandage du fumier est une des rares pratique agricole qui a laissé des traces archéologiques. En effet, l'incorporation des
déchets domestiques dans les fumures a entraîné la dispersion de poteries cassées dans les parcelles amendées.
L'interprétation du mobilier hors-site de prospection comme vestiges de ces épandages est basée sur des textes anciens et des
preuves archéologiques. Le projet français ArchaeDyn visait à identifier les grandes tendances et les particularités locales
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
concernant la mise en valeur agraire des champs, de l'Antiquité à l'époque moderne, sur plusieurs zones d'études françaises.
Nous avons défini des indicateurs pour estimer la stabilité et la durabilité de l'occupation agraire, basée sur l'analyse spatiale
de ce matériel hors site. Les résultats donnent l'image de pulsations spatiales et chronologiques des espaces cultivées dans la
longue durée
Introduction
Off-site material collected while fieldwalking surveys has been considered for a long time as a
‘background noise’, an impediment to the detection of sites. In the last forty years, the extent of
archaeologists’ interest from the site to the territory has led to a reconsideration of this off-site
material and the use of it as a marker of formerly cultivated areas (Wilkinson 1982; Bintliff –
Snodgrass 1988; Wilkinson 1989; Bakels 1997). Whereas this interpretation is commonly
accepted in most of Anglo-Saxon countries and used by few French researchers (Raynaud 1989;
Favory – Fiches 1994), there is still a debate regarding the interpretation of this material (Forbes
2013). That is why we wanted to formalise it and to document the practice of improving the soil
from Antiquity to Modern Period (Poirier – Nuninger 2012). At the same time, the French
Archaedyn Project was engaged in a study of the time-space dynamics of agricultural spaces
from Protohistory to Modern Times based on off-site material collected during fieldwalking
campaigns in different study areas of northern and southern France (Poirier – Tolle 2008; Poirier
et al. 2012).
Off-site material as remain of manuring practices?
Even if this does not constitute a proof, we have to mention at the outset that most of the
fieldwalking campaigns conducted in France during the last thirty years have led to the collection
of off-site material dating from the Bronze Age to nowadays (Ferdière – Zadora-Rio 1986;
Ferdière – Rialland 1994; Favory – Fiches 1994; Ferdière – Rialland 1995; 1996; Poirot 1998;
2010). If this presence is clearly visible, its interpretation as the product of manuring practices is
based on an initial assumption that the spreading of livestock manure collected in barns was used
during earlier periods. To confirm this hypothesis, we will first focus on the identification of
written and iconographic sources attesting the ancient practice of manuring.
Manuring of croplands is attested since Antiquity
2/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
Most of the Roman agronomists recommended the use of manure to improve the quality of soil:
Cato (2nd century BC) details the necessary tools to spread the manure (De Re Rustica, V); Varro
(1st century BC) suggests that the dunghill has to be located near the farmstead (Res Rusticae, I,
38, 3); Columella (1st centuryAD) is the most explicit regarding the spreading of manure,
detailing the quantities needed for a given area (De Agricultura, II, 5). Pliny the Elder (1st
century AD) specified which types of soil need improvement, the best time in the year to spread
the manure, the required quantities of livestock to produce enough manure, etc. (Naturalis
Historia, XVIII, 53).
Iconographic sources, such as the agricultural calendar found on a mosaic at Saint-Romain-en-
Gal (France), illustrate the spreading of manure (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1. Mosaïc illustrating the transport of manure (Saint-Romain-en-Gal, France).
These texts and recommendations regarding the use of manure were compiled and
transmitted during the Middle Ages by means of the agronomic literature from the 13th century,
for example in the Ruralium commodorum libri duodecim of Pietro de Crescenzi. From the
Carolingian period, the ‘Capitulare de Villis’ had already advised to spread not only the manure,
but also all the waste from the farm (Delatouche 1977, 81). Taxation, rental and sale documents
also contain information about the practice of manuring. For example, in southern France, we
can find many references to structures that can be identified as manure pits, called femoracius
(Puig 2003). We also sometimes have references to the sale of manure (Monnet 1992), or the
duty of a tenant to spread manure over the land at least one time during the period he occupies it
3/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
(Brunel 2004; Viader 2006). The medieval iconography also attests to the practice of manuring
(Mane 1985). The Rustican mentioned above contains an agricultural calendar illustrating this
practice for the month of February: two men are spreading manure in a closed space where many
other piles have been already dispersed (Fig. 2).
Fig. 2. Agronomic treatise from Pietro di Crescenzi, 1459. February dedicated to the
spreading of animal manure, Condé Museum, Chantilly, France, Ms 340.
Domestic waste could be incorporated into the manure.
The second assumption is that domestic waste, including sherds of pottery, could be incorporated
into the manure, deliberately or not. These sherds and fragments of building materials were
mixed with other waste on manure piles usually located near the settlement, and spread with
organic materials in the fields,. They alone would have survived once the organic matter had
decomposed. This assumption is supported by a number of sources confirming the incorporation
of household waste, including the sherds of broken pottery, within the manure spread.
The proximity between houses and stables or manure pits
4/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
The first argument is common sense. The proximity of residential and livestock buildings
suggests that there would have been a more or less conscious mixture of organic and
manufactured waste in the formation of manure. One cannot imagine why a strict separation
would have been made between the different sources of organic matter production, when often
the partition between the living spaces of humans and animal housing was only slightly marked
materially. Such close proximity was also recommended in ancient (Varro, Res Rusticae, I, 13)
and medieval agricultural treatises (Mane 1985, 736).
The incorporation was recommended by agronomists
Ancient agricultural literature also recommended the incorporation of domestic waste into the
manure. Cato proposed that the periods of bad weather should be dedicated to the cleaning of
stables, barns, and all the buildings of the farm (De Re Rustica, XXXIX). Columella indicates that
the farmer should collect all the waste from the farm, and keep it in a pit (De Agricultura, II, 14).
The same advice is given in the medieval treaties (Fleta, II, 73 cited by Grand – Delatouche
1950, 267).
This incorporation is attested by archaeological sources, geochemical observations, and
archival texts.
Recent archaeological evidence also attest to the incorporation of household waste into manure.
During archaeological fieldwork, slight excavated structures have been interpreted as remains of
manure pits (Ciezar-Epailly – Gonzalez 1998). This interpretation, based on the organic nature of
the sediment and occasionally supported by chemical analysis, illustrates in concrete terms the
practices and facilities mentioned in medieval texts. It is important to note that in the excavated
examples, the pit is located close to residential buildings and sediment found in these structures
contained sherds, thus proving the reality of the mixture of animal litter and waste from the
house.
The iconography can once again support this argument. The few existing iconographic
representations of the dunghill are those depicting the biblical parable of Job, a wealthy noble
who should bear with resignation the loss of his property, his children, and the suffering of the
disease. The text – and some iconographic representations – described him on a dunghill
scattered with sherds which he uses to scratch his wounds (Fig. 3).
5/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
Fig. 3. Job on his manure pile strewn of bones and shards - Book of Hours of Anne of Brittany
(XVth century). Copy of 1848, Curmer editions, Loches castle (Indre-et-Loire, France).
It should finally be noted that the chemical and biological soil analyses identifying high levels of
trace elements allow the recognition of sites themselves and their associated areas of activities.
Human activities developed within a settlement have a tendency to enrich the soil with certain
elements, including potassium, magnesium and phosphorus (Entwistle et al. 1998, 54). In
particular, it has been repeatedly demonstrated that high levels of metals (lead, copper and zinc)
were indicative of the presence of inhabited sites (Bintliff et al. 1990, 11; Linderholm – Lundberg
1994, 310; Entwistle et al. 1998, 66). Bintliff also noted that a halo of a hundred metres is
detectable around the sites, probably due to inputs or the presence of animals (Bintliff et al. 1990,
12). It is even possible to observe a strict correlation between the levels of metals (lead, copper,
zinc) and density of offsite material collected around the sites (Neil Rimmington 2000). The land-
use can in turn be detected by high levels of phosphorus. Indeed, the spreading of manure, rich in
phosphorus, contributes to mark chemically the areas that received significant inputs over time
(Entwistle et al. 2000, 300). This association between phosphorus and manure has been well
demonstrated by measurements in gardens which have much higher phosphorus rates than those
on the associated areas (Entwistle et al. 1998, 64). There may also be a direct relationship
between the amount of soil organic matter and density of archaeological artefacts collected in the
topsoil (Poirier 2010, 97).
An ancient but still discussed interpretation
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N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
This assumption about the interpretation of off-site material as a vestige of agrarian inputs is
sometimes denied by using other explanations. Fentress (2000, 47) recalled the main alternative
interpretations.
Lost artefacts, ephemeral occupations?
The first is the archaeological myth of the ‘vase that fell off the mule’, identifying the off-site
remains as lost and broken objects was already been considered and rejected in 1980s by Bintliff
and Snodgrass (Bintliff – Snodgrass 1988). The second concerns the very ephemeral remains of
meals left by field workers or transhumance routes and seasonal movements of people who may
have left slight traces. These alternative interpretations are, however, not sufficient to explain the
regular presence and quantities that can be very large, of pottery sherds scattered in the topsoil,
up to several thousands of sherds per hectare in southern France at the Roman period, for
example (Raynaud 2000).
A ‘background noise’ produced by eroded sites?
A third interpretation is to consider the presence of sites eroded by natural phenomena (alluvial
or colluvial) or anthropogenic processes (eg. agricultural practices) that could not be detected in
the usual form of definable concentrations. Sherds moved by runoff from natural erosion are
clearly identifiable by their high wear, which often makes their typological classification
problematic. Displacement by erosion leads to downslope concentrations of sherds, which look
like pebbles and are radically different from manuring shards. The density and regular
dissemination of manuring shards implies an activity that goes beyond the phenomenon of
erosion. Far from being random, as if it resulted from a mechanical action of erosion, the spread
of this material appears generally associated with that of contemporary archaeological sites.
The hypothesis of the erosion of sites due to post-depositional anthropogenic activities also
seems unconvincing. Cultural practices are often put forward to explain the dispersion of
artefacts related to a buried site rather than the spreading of manure material. However, the
experimental archaeological work carried out in England in the Butser Ancient Farm by
Reynolds has clearly demonstrated the low displacement of fragments in the topsoil on the
horizontal plane as a result of agricultural practices (Reynolds 1988; Clark – Schofield 1991). We
can also notice a good fit between the area of material concentration visible in field surveys, and
7/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
the surface of underlying excavated structures, which argues in favour of a low dispersion of
these artifacts (Ferdière – Rialland 1995).
Too little manure and not enough transportation means?
A final objection to discuss is that the manure was rare and should be reserved for parcels
requiring the most attention, such as enclosed gardens attached to houses; and that transportation
means and necessary energy for their implementation did not permit a spreading of manure on a
large scale or in spaces too far from the settlement.
However, this statement is contradicted by the agronomic literature itself, which speaks of
manure spreading in the fields (‘in agrum’ in Varro, Res Rusticae, I, 13), for cereals (‘segelibus’
in Columella, De Agricultura, II, 14). In addition, some observations of the cultural practices of
traditional societies in Africa show that it is possible to transport the dried manure with baskets
over fairly long distances (up to 2 km) (Sautter 1993, 449). This transport of small regular
amounts, which is also indicated in the texts of the Roman agronomists, ancient or medieval
iconographic sources already cited, therefore suggest an input into plots that can be quite distant
from the source settlement.
Preliminary conclusion: off-site material can be used as a marker of improved areas
Regarding all these arguments, we can conclude that the off-site material collected during
fieldwalking surveys may reflect the location of intensely cultivated areas.
This position has been supported since the 1970s by several researchers, especially G. Foard in
England who was one of the first to draw attention to the importance of this material, previously
interpreted as a ‘background noise’ (Foard 1978).
Research in this direction has permitted us to move on from a view of survey only focused on the
discovery of settlement sites, in favour of an understanding of a continuous space, where ‘off-
site’ material can mark the influence of settlements on the surrounding area.
However, the location of improved spaces only provides a minimal estimation of the effectively
exploited area. Indeed, a number of conditions are necessary for the discovery of spread material.
It only marks that part of the territory given over to agriculture, land where an input was
necessary to obtain a satisfactory harvest, where an organic amendment was applied consisting
of manure from animals living near the settlement for a sufficient period of time to allow the
accumulation of material. Besides these conditions, the presence of off-site material is still
8/21
N. Poirier, “Archaeological evidence for agrarian manuring: Studying the time-space dynamics of agricultural areas with surface-collected off-site material”, in:
Klapste J. (ed.), Agrarian technology in the medieval landscape, Ruralia X, Brepols, 2016, p. 279-290.
conditioned by a number of filters related to the amount of ceramic in circulation at different
times, the management of waste and the number of cattle available.
The absence of off-site material does not allow the conclusion that the areas in question were not
cultivated, but opens up a range of possibilities which it is not possible to decide between.
The study of agrarian spaces within the French Archaedyn Project.
The ArchaeDyn1 program aims to develop quantitative indicators of density and flows of
population and economic activities in the long time, as well as space allowances of exploited
areas. It proposes to clarify the question of links between the different levels of integration of the
territorial system by multiscale and multidisciplinary approach (Nuninger et al. 2008).
A working group dedicated to cultivated areas has developed a protocol for analysing agrarian
spreading identified through off-site material collected in fieldwalking surveys, compared to the
inhabited sites, and the modelling of their spatial and diachronic dynamics, including the
definition of relevant indicators to estimate the stability and durability of the human investment
over time (Poirier et al. 2012).
A diachronic, comparative and quantitative approach
It is a comparative approach that aims to compare the trajectories of development of rural areas
in six different micro regions of northern and southern France.
The study areas
The study area of Neuvy-le-Roi in Touraine was systematically surveyed between 1992 and 1996
(Poirot 1998), while the valley of Choisille was surveyed as limited windows between 2006 and
2008 in the part of the ECLIPSE II program which aimed particularly to measure the link
between land-use and erosion dynamics (Poirier et al. 2013). In Berry, I surveyed the area of
Sancergues between 2003 and 2006 as part of my doctoral research whose goal was to model the
territorial dynamics in the long term (Poirier 2010). In Languedoc, the study areas of Lunellois
and Vaunage were surveyed in 1980s and 1990s under the direction of C. Raynaud and F. Favory
and have been the subject of extensive analyses of population dynamics within the
1. Funding from ANR (Research National Agency), ANR-08-BLAN-0157-01
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Description:https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01303474. Submitted on 18 Apr 2016. HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and
